2013.05.06 13:00 - Buddha Shaped Quiet

The Guardian for this meeting was Eliza Madrigal. The comments are by Eliza Madrigal.

--15 minute BELL--

(1:20pm)


Wol Euler: _/|\_
Eliza Madrigal: Hello Wol :) You're just in time ... we can take a pause in 5 minutes :)
Wol Euler smiles.
Wol Euler: good thing I thought to double-check!
Eliza Madrigal: glad you did... it is sort of the spirit of the thing just to come if you can, and I'll just be here...

Eliza Madrigal: like some turkish tea?
Wol Euler: thank you, I will
(tea gives marvelous descriptions of its contents)
Eliza Madrigal smiles... enjoying these descriptives
Wol Euler: there's a motto to live by!

Eliza Madrigal: how is the day?
Wol Euler: oddly mixed, mostly good
Wol Euler: had the first proper storm of 2013 today, just misssed getting soaked
Eliza Madrigal: storming a lot here too... really love it
Eliza Madrigal: but not being 'out' in it too much
Wol Euler nods.
Wol Euler: I wasn't so much out in as watching it develop and then almost running to get home from work before it started
Eliza Madrigal: :)

Eliza Madrigal: btw today I gathered "secular blessings" or quotes from a few scientists rather than zen masters ...
Wol Euler: ah! nice
Eliza Madrigal: in a minute I'll ring the first bell then we come back after the 90 seconds :)
Wol Euler nods.


                   "Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them." Albert Einstein
--BELL--


Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler: _/|\_
Wol Euler: that was very smooth
Wol Euler: mellow, calm
Wol Euler: I'm almost tempted to say "limpid"
Eliza Madrigal: nice... think affected by the rain as well?
Wol Euler: possibly

Wol Euler: the sound of car tires on a wet road is one that I love
Wol Euler: and never hear in winter (another sign of Spring! have to report it)
Eliza Madrigal: must say I've never isolated that sound... when hearing yes, but as a noticing, no....
Eliza Madrigal: thank you

Wol Euler: Jim Morrison brought it to my attention :)
Wol Euler: "cars hiss by my window/like the waves down on the beach"
Eliza Madrigal: mmmm
Wol Euler: and they do have that same quality, at least in evening times of sparse traffic

Wol Euler: actually, I had an unusual experience while sitting just then
Wol Euler: not an out-of-body experience, but an in-another-body experience :)
Eliza Madrigal: hm...
Wol Euler: I felt very Buddha-like, I felt the breadth and solidity, the weight of his body, the heft of his belly
Wol Euler: it felt very calm, like wearing your parent's far-too-big, heavy, thick winter coat :)
Eliza Madrigal: a very sweet image, Wol
Eliza Madrigal: settling... kind
Wol Euler: I'm not sure where it came from
Eliza Madrigal: what you say reminds me of meditation instructions I remember from somewhere...
Eliza Madrigal: perhaps Dudjom Rinpoche... the instructions were "solid and open"

Wol Euler: hello Zon, we are having a meditation session today
Wol Euler: (all modays at 1pm for the next while)
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Zon :) didn't see you arrive - welcome!
Zon Kwan: does that mean..no talk ?
Eliza Madrigal: It just means that we pause a bit longer.. take things a bit more slowly
Wol Euler nods.
Eliza Madrigal: :) and sit among the mossy greens
Wol Euler smiles.
Wol Euler: and the lovely seamless garden image behind/around us, which I have been admiring

Eliza Madrigal: Bleu did a nice job with this.... the famous moss garden in Kyoto...
Wol Euler: ah :)
Eliza Madrigal: So Zon at1:40 I'll ring a bell and we'll pause until we come back after the 90 seconds
Eliza Madrigal: here we are :)

                "For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love." -Carl Sagan

Zon Kwan: waves..

--BELL--

Eliza Madrigal: _ / \_
Wol Euler: _/|\_
Eliza Madrigal: was smiling... realized a lot of really wonderful moments in the day
Wol Euler smiles.
Wol Euler: nice
Eliza Madrigal: began with younger daughter, who weeks and weeks after an event with friends, was on the way home saying how happy she was about it, etc.... I marveled at how long her appreciation lasts
Wol Euler smiles.
Eliza Madrigal: then remembered these wonderful spider web strands hanging from a tree this morning... blowing in the wind
Eliza Madrigal: they were all over it... almost like part of the tree
Wol Euler nods.

Eliza Madrigal: the first thing my son asked when coming home was whether I photographed it.... I'd forgotten...
Eliza Madrigal: was his discovery
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler: ah :)
Wol Euler: you'll just have to both remember
Wol Euler: or write it down
Wol Euler: for your collection of "photographs I didn't take"
Eliza Madrigal smiles - really like that
Eliza Madrigal: list of "things I don't remember"
Wol Euler: heheheh
Wol Euler: one can coopt an external memory system
Wol Euler: subcontracting, as it were
Eliza Madrigal: :) new meaning to the phrase "hook me up"
Wol Euler smiles.
Eliza Madrigal: now we're getting just silly - good thing there is a pause approaching soon again :) how was your quiet this time?

Wol Euler: just as buddha-shaped :)
Wol Euler: I'm enjoying it
Eliza Madrigal: :)

Wol Euler: actually it may have a very prosaic cause, which I won't tell you about until after the next sitting
Eliza Madrigal: ok
Eliza Madrigal: no quote with next pause... not so many cues needed perhaps
Wol Euler prepares inwardly and outwardly.

--BELL--

Wol Euler: _/|\_
Eliza Madrigal: :)

Wol Euler: that was a lovely but strangely long six minutes :)
Eliza Madrigal giggles.... felt it quite long as well
Wol Euler smiles.
Wol Euler: not uncomfortably so, it was enjoyable
Eliza Madrigal: agree
Eliza Madrigal: was thinking... mostly about Rosatta's excercise of talking to fairies, which I was playing with earlier too :)
Eliza Madrigal: so... prosaic?
Wol Euler: ah :)
Wol Euler listens.
Eliza Madrigal: was just enjoying talking to myself on paper - we didn't figure anything out but clarified a picture of a sensibility
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler grins.
Eliza Madrigal listens
Wol Euler: that sounds good

Wol Euler: okay, the prosaic possible cause of my feeling like Buddha is my newest avatar in my newest game, Guild Wars 2.
Wol Euler: which friends bought for me after I said (in chat here in SL) that I was too cheap to spend that much money on a game :)
Eliza Madrigal: haha

Wol Euler: most of my avatars in most of these worlds are delicate creatures
Wol Euler: in retrospect that is probably why I mostly play females in Warcraft, the male bodies are (to me) ugly and musclebound
Eliza Madrigal thinks of San using the word 'tanks" :)
Wol Euler: so, this character is by race a Norn, very large humans
Wol Euler: yes, right
Wol Euler: meatstacks
Wol Euler: and all ridiculously muscled too
Wol Euler: so, the norn are big. Not just tall but big all around
Wol Euler: and exceptionally I chose to play one rather than any other race, and made him male, and made him as big as possible
Eliza Madrigal: interesting
Wol Euler: as tall as the slider went, and with a huge barrel chest / belly and stocky legs
Wol Euler: so not the muscle-tank
Wol Euler: he looks like he could pick up a bear and hsake it like a tablecloth :)

Wol Euler: anyway, I think that I was feeling that body around me
Eliza Madrigal: hah... really curious now how you feel with him
Eliza Madrigal: I see!
Wol Euler: I do embody in nearly all the avatars I use / play / live in
Wol Euler: I've dreamed about most of them
Wol Euler: and this feels rather like a waking dream of being in that body
Wol Euler: like Dan, Roseanne's husband, a huge bear of a man but gentle

Eliza Madrigal: it seems a long time that I've been aware of dreaming as an SL avatar, yet I blend SL and RL all the time in dreams...
Wol Euler nods.
Eliza Madrigal: am just less aware that I am in my dreams, if that makes sense?
Wol Euler: who is the I who is less in them? :)
Wol Euler smiles.
Eliza Madrigal: seasons I guess... coming and going
Wol Euler nods.

Eliza Madrigal: is this game a WoW offshoot?
Wol Euler: sort of, yes; there are similarities and differences
Wol Euler: main similarity is that it's online, a multiplayer world
Wol Euler: with no "save", no "restart"
Eliza Madrigal: oh no
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler: and set in a sort of mediaeval / pre renaissance time/spirit/technology, swords and magic
Eliza Madrigal: no brakes or parking?
Wol Euler: nope :)
Wol Euler: but also unlike WoW in significant ways
Wol Euler: it's visually very beautiful, lovely to look at

Eliza Madrigal: how does that work? how can you be here ... is your large avatar doing things on his own?
Wol Euler: oh no, you log in and out, like SL
Wol Euler: but the world goes on around you, and you re-enter at the place and storyline-time you left it
Eliza Madrigal: ah
Wol Euler: like when I log out of SL and log back in, you will still remmeber what I said and did
Eliza Madrigal: that seems 'like' saving at least

--BELL--

Wol Euler: not like a static offline game, where I could go back and cover up my mistakes
Eliza Madrigal: ahhh, understand :)

Malinson Resident: hello
Wol Euler: hello mal
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Malinson :)
Wol Euler: brb
Eliza Madrigal: you are true bloo today
Malinson Resident: okay
Eliza Madrigal: how are you doing Mal?
Malinson Resident: oh, gettin aroud....how bout ur'self?
Wol Euler: boom boom!
Eliza Madrigal: spose the same
Wol Euler: ah, the old jokes are best

Eliza Madrigal: do apologize but I can't stay ... this is the end of the retreat part of session and its time to head to son's tutoring
Wol Euler nods.
Malinson Resident: Don't blame you.
Eliza Madrigal: would offer you tea but hm...
Wol Euler: happy tutoring!
Eliza Madrigal: thanks
Wol Euler: I too have to move on, boss is out of office tomorrow so I have to start punctually
Wol Euler: thank you eliza, I'm so glad I thought to check in today
Eliza Madrigal: Mal.... come to session sometime
Eliza Madrigal: nice to see you both
Eliza Madrigal: bye for now
Wol Euler: bye!

Wol Euler: this is new, by the way, mondays at 1pm are meditation sessions (much but not all silent sitting)
Wol Euler: for the next while
Wol Euler: take care, mal